Break the Ice Wall of Conflict at the End of the Earth

The Israel-Palestine conflict has been stained by assassinations and suicide bombings for more than three years since Palestine’s intifada (revolt against Israel) in September 2000. Is there a real end for this bloody fight, which has seen no sign of settlement over the years?

A group of eight Israelis and Palestinians who will embark an expedition to climb an unexplored mountain in Antarctica on January 1, 2004, say, “Everything has the end.”

The members, each of whom has their own emotional injury from the bitter fight between Israel and Palestine, will spend 35 days climbing an unnamed and unexplored mountain and name it.

The project name of this team, currently waiting in Puerto Williams, Chile, is “Breaking the Ice,” which implies looking for a solution and beginning relations.

“Let’s break the ice wall between Jews and Arabs!” When Heskel Nathaniel, a Jew who is engaged in real estate development in Berlin, Germany, conceived this project everyone took it as a joke. However, Extreme Peace Missions (EPM), an organization which promotes friendship through expedition, took it seriously and put it into action.

Each of the six men and two women has their own bitter history.

Doron Erel, a professional climber, has Polish parents who narrowly escaped death during the Holocaust. An Israeli doctor, Yarden Fanta, came to Israel alone at the age of 14 when all her family was massacred in Ethiopia. An Israeli lawyer, Awni Qasem, and Erel are former members of the Israeli Army elite units.

Palestinians Naser Quass and Suleiman Alcativ have been jailed for attacking Israel security forces. The team includes Ziad Darwish, whose brother was killed by Israel security forces and Olfat Haider, a Palestinian who has played as a state amateur of Israel.

The team members gathered for training at the ocean near Tel Aviv in September. They built friendships through repeated climbing training at 30 degrees below zero in November.

They will set sail in the first day of 2004 on 965 kilometer voyage navigating through the Drake Passage. “This course is one of the hardest courses on the Earth,” said The Guardian, a British newspaper. They will anchor off the coast of the Antarctic Peninsula and climb an unclimbed mountain.

Four Nobel peace prize winners, the Dalai Lama, Yasser Arafat, Shimon Peres and Mikhail Gorbachov, conveyed messages of blessing. U.N. Secretary General Kofi Annan and the President of the European Parliament, Pat Cox, also wished them luck.

Their daily cruise will be documented through the Internet site www.breaking-the-ice.de and on conclusion of the cruise a film for television will be made. Mr. Nathaniel said, “We don’t expect an immediate response from politicians but we want to transmit hope to our peoples.”

Ki-Tae Kwon kkt@donga.com